# Set up your catalog (do this first)

> Tell your store how products are priced, whether you track stock, what the Add Product form asks for, and your default options like Size or Colour.

Guide: https://sitesplaced.com/help/online-stores/catalog-and-fields · Section: Online Stores · Last reviewed: 2026-08-23

**Catalog & fields** is the one-time setup that shapes your whole product workflow. It decides how products are priced (one price, or a different price per size or colour), whether stock is tracked and how, exactly which boxes the **Add Product** form shows you, and which options and extra details every product can carry. Get it right once and adding products is fast forever. It lives at **Settings → Catalog & fields** — or type *catalog* into the **Search settings…** box.

> **Quick path:** Store dashboard → **Settings** → **Catalog & fields**. The same screen is one tap away from the Products tab: click the small info icon next to the *Products* heading and choose **Change in catalog setup →**.

Most sellers can leave everything as-is and just start adding products — the defaults give you one price per product, one stock count per product, and a form with name, price, description, categories, item code and stock. Open this screen when you sell something with options (sizes, colours, weights), want to rename or hide a field, or want extra details like material or warranty on every product.

## Describe what you sell (fastest start)

At the top, the **Product setup** card asks *In one line, what do you sell? We'll set the rest up for you.* Type something like *Sneakers in different sizes and colours. I track stock for each size.* and press **✨ Set it up for me** — SitesPlaced fills in the pricing model, stock model, options and fields below to match. This AI setup is part of the Growth plan; on the free plan the button shows as **🔒 Set it up for me (Pro)** and you set the same things by hand in the cards below, which takes a couple of minutes.

## Pricing & stock

In the **Pricing & stock** card you name your catalog and choose two models:

- **Catalog name** — an internal label such as *Standard product catalog*. Customers never see it.
- **Pricing** — **One price per product**, or **Different price per option** so a Large can cost more than a Small. With per-option pricing the product form shows a *Base price* plus a price column in the options table.
- **Stock tracking** — **One stock count per product** (one shared pool, even if the product has options), **Stock per option** (a separate count for each size or colour), or **Don't track stock** (everything is always available).

This is why your product form sometimes shows a single price and stock box and sometimes a grid — it follows the models you pick here. If you leave a product's stock blank it is treated as unlimited. A tracked product whose stock reaches 0 shows as sold out on the storefront and cannot be added to the cart; a product with options only shows sold out when every option is at 0. When stock is deducted and restored is explained in [Track inventory & stock](https://sitesplaced.com/help/md/online-stores/inventory-and-stock.md).

## What you fill in for each product

The **What you fill in for each product** card lists the core fields — name, price, description, category, image, video, item code (SKU) and stock. For each one you can **rename the label** (call *sku* *Design no.* if that is what your team says) and tick or untick **Enabled**. Name, price, description and category are marked **Required** and cannot be turned off; the rest are optional. Your Add Product form shows exactly the enabled fields — so if you never use an *Item code*, switch it off and the box disappears.

## Default options (like Size or Colour)

If most of your products share the same options, set them once in the **Default options (like Size or Colour)** card. Press **+ Add option**, give it a name such as *Size*, and list the choices separated by commas — *S, M, L, XL*. Add a second option for *Colour* with *Red, Blue, Green*. Then on each product you can pull the option in with one tap and create every size-and-colour combination at once. Prefer to do it per product? Skip this card and add options directly on the product instead; the result is the same.

Options set here are copied onto a product when you apply them, so editing the list later only affects products you apply it to afterwards. The product form also offers **Apply to all products**, which adds an option to every product that does not already have its own — handy when you set this up after importing a catalogue.

## Extra product details

Need fields beyond the basics — **material**, **weight**, **warranty**, **occasion**? Press **+ Add field** in the **Extra product details** card and give it a label and a type (*text*, *number*, *url* or *yes / no*). Tick **Required** to insist on a value, and **Storefront filter** to let customers filter your products page by it. The fields then appear in an **Attributes** card on every product, where you type values separated by commas (for example *Party, Work*).

> **Filters need the sidebar layout:** **Storefront filter** only shows on the live products page once that page uses the sidebar layout. Turn it on under **Settings → Pages & policies → Products page filters**; the catalog screen reminds you of this whenever a filterable field is set.

## Saving your catalog setup

This screen saves differently from the rest of Settings. The **Product setup** card has its own **Save setup** button — press it after changing anything on this page. Next to it, **Undo** restores the previous setup if a change turned out wrong (the message *Reverted to previous catalog structure* confirms it). The regular Settings save bar at the bottom of the screen is for the other sections and does not save your catalog.

## Good to know & troubleshooting

- **Changing the catalog later is fine**, but doing it before you add lots of products saves you editing them all afterwards. Products you have already created keep their existing prices and stock; the new models apply to how the form behaves from now on.
- **The form still shows a field I turned off** — press **Save setup** on the catalog screen, then reopen the product. The form reads the saved setup, not the draft.
- **I need stock per size but only see one stock box** — set **Stock tracking** to **Stock per option**. The product form also offers a **Track stock per option** shortcut the moment you add options to a product; it changes this same setting for the whole store.
- **I want different prices per colour but the same stock** — choose **Different price per option** with **One stock count per product**. The two models are independent.
- **Weights and quantities** (250 g / 500 g / 1 kg) are just options like any other — add *Weight* as a default option with per-option pricing.
- **Importing from a sheet or another platform?** The [Importer](https://sitesplaced.com/import) reads sizes, colours and stock from the source and sets this screen up for you. Check it afterwards rather than building it by hand.

Next: [define your categories](https://sitesplaced.com/help/md/online-stores/categories-and-collections.md), then [add your products](https://sitesplaced.com/help/md/online-stores/add-products.md). For a worked example of sizes and colours, see [Sell sizes & colours](https://sitesplaced.com/help/md/how-to-guides/sell-sizes-and-colours.md).

**Q: Do I have to do this before adding products?**

No — the defaults work for simple products. But if you sell sizes, colours or weights, set the pricing and stock models first so the Add Product form asks for the right things and you do not have to edit every product later.

**Q: What is the difference between an option and an extra detail?**

An option (Size, Colour) is something the customer chooses before buying, and it can have its own price and stock. An extra detail (material, warranty) is information shown on the product page, and can optionally be used as a filter.

**Q: Is the AI setup available on the free plan?**

No. The 'Set it up for me' button is part of the Growth plan. Everything it would set — pricing model, stock model, options and fields — can be set manually on the same screen in a couple of minutes.

**Q: Why didn't my change save?**

The catalog screen has its own Save setup button inside the Product setup card. The save bar at the bottom of Settings saves the other sections but not the catalog. Press Save setup and check for the 'Catalog structure saved' message.